


Pillow Talk

by Tierfal



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist
Genre: Canon: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Fluff, Humor, M/M, Romance, Schmoop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-03
Updated: 2012-05-03
Packaged: 2017-11-04 18:45:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/397028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tierfal/pseuds/Tierfal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ed wants to list all of the things that suck about Drachma.  Roy wants some sleep.</p>
<p>[Some spoilers for Brotherhood 'verse.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pillow Talk

**Author's Note:**

> I should really get subsidized by dentists for writing stuff like this.

“I hate Drachma and Drachmans and everything they stand for,” Ed says.

“No, you don’t,” General Has-Proven-Multiple-Times-That-He-Is- _Not_ -a-Mindreader says.

“Do so,” Ed says. “I hate their smarmy-ass diplomats, and their sneery wives, and the way they look at _you_ like you’re some kind of scumbag and heavily imply that you should go back to Xing or whatever; and I hate those giant furry hats that I’m not even allowed to laugh at; and I hate their language; and I hate how they all carry guns; and I hate that they’re overcharging us for goddamn everything; and I hate the scratchy wool blankets at this stupid hotel.” He rubs the corner against Roy’s cheek as evidence. Roy’s nose wrinkles, which is pretty much a concession of victory, but then he squirms away, which makes Ed’s side of the bed really cold again. So Ed wriggles over to follow, bringing his share of the stupid scratchy blankets with him.

“You don’t hate the potato dumplings with the gravy,” Roy mumbles into the pillow.

Ed lifts Roy’s arm up, shifts himself under it, wraps it around his waist, and settles. “Yeah, but the Drachmans don’t _stand for_ the potato dumplings with the gravy. They just sort of make them and then hide them behind a bunch of gross soups and weird hors d’oeuvrey things that even you don’t know how to eat; I _saw_ you.”

General How-Etiquette-Became-My-Religion-When-I-Grew-Up-in-a-Bar-No-One-Knows’s sleepy laugh mostly gets lost in the pillow. “Was I that obvious?”

“No,” Ed says, rather generously, he feels. “I was just watching pretty close. And I know how your mouth does that pulled-tight thing when something is super-awkward, and you want to laugh, but you know you can’t. They probably just thought you don’t like raw shellfish served with horseradish in an egg-cup or whatever that was. Which no human being should ever like, because it’s unnatural.”

Roy’s fingertips impose themselves under the hem of Ed’s nightshirt and rub idly at his side. “I’m flattered that you were paying attention to me when there were so many silly hats to vituperate.”

“It’s not my fault you’re the only person in the universe who can make that stupid formal-uniform-dress-thing look _good_.”

“Thank you,” Roy says. Ed can never decide whether it’s annoying or really cool that he always picks up on the sideways compliments, no matter how many expletives Ed buries them in sometimes. “You looked distractingly delectable yourself.”

“If you mean in comparison to the food, that’s not saying much.”

“You could distract me from the Northern Lights, Edward.” That’s another thing that’s either extremely irritating or fabulous—Roy gets so _cheesy_ sometimes, especially when he’s tired like this, and he’s been working all day and can finally let his guard down. “You’re always striking in strong colors, but I didn’t realize just how much a tuxedo would emphasize your eyes.”

Ed tries not to blush. He tries _hard_.

No dice.

Roy’s fingertips smooth their way up to his ribs; scratchy or not, these dumb blankets hold heat pretty well, and it’s getting nice and toasty under here. “I wish you’d spent more of the evening on my arm, if only so that I didn’t have to imagine bending you over the desserts table every time I glanced over and saw you there.”

Ed nudges the nearest shin with the automail foot. He doesn’t kick anymore; it was funny how Roy would howl up until the time Ed accidentally drew blood, so nowadays he’s more careful. This gets the message across anyway. “First of all, don’t start talking about sex when you’re too tired to follow through, or I’m going to bite you. Second, did you see the way the Drachman officials’ stupid wives were looking at me? I had to prove I wasn’t your bitch or your slave or something.”

“Mmm,” Roy says into the pillow. “We should roleplay that sometime.”

Ed bites him.

…gently.

“Ow,” Roy says. Ed releases his shoulder, which now has damp teeth marks. “Little cannibal.”

Ed bristles. “Big enough to eat _you_.”

Roy extricates his hand from Ed’s shirt and uses it to ruffle his hair instead. “As you have proven on many very enjoyable occasions.”

Ed nudges his shin a little harder this time. “I _told_ you not to tease me when you’re clearly about to pass out. Why didn’t you just sleep on the train?”

“I was reviewing policy, as you would know if you hadn’t spent the duration of the trip drooling on my knee and snoring.”

“I don’t snore.”

“You do. It’s adorable.”

“It is _not_ adorable.”

“This is a battle you are going to lose, Edward.”

Ed pouts, realizes that probably won’t help his case (not that there’s a case, because he’s _not ‘adorable’_ ), scowls instead, and nestles in a little closer to examine Roy’s ear.

Nice ear. Very eary.

“Go to sleep,” Roy says.

“I found something sort of tiramisu-y at the desserts table,” Ed says.

“You are so very, very fortunate,” Roy says into the pillow, “that you’re cuter than a bucket full of kittens and ducklings.”

“Al said in his last letter that he’d adopted a duckling,” Ed says. “He said he named it Mustang because it kept looking at his term papers like it was reading them and then quacking like it had corrections.”

“A duckling named Mustang,” Roy says.

“Yeah, and he said it’ll splash its head into water and then shake like you do in the bath. Not that I told him that you do that in the bath. Because you’d probably kill me if I was telling my brother what you do in the bath, right?”

“Go to sleep, Ed.”

“I can’t,” Ed says. “I hate Drachma, and the blankets itch, and people kept looking at you and then looking at me like I was some kind of…”

“Arrestingly attractive young man of rare Xerxesian origin who is unusually self-possessed for his age?”

“I was going to say ‘gold-digging whore,’ but I think I like yours better.”

Roy cracks an eye open to look at him somewhat incisively. “I’ve never known you to care what others think of you.”

“It’s not that I _care_ ,” Ed says, “so much as that it kind of pisses me off, but I can’t, like, spike the punch or transmute somebody into a parrot to get my revenge.”

The visible dark eye twinkles. “Yes, I dare say transmuting High Chancellor Vladiskov into a parrot might set diplomatic relations back a bit. Even if it might suit him well.”

“You kidding?” Ed says. “Vladiskov is a bullfrog all the way. And that creepy advisor guy is a spider or a stick insect or a praying mantis or something. Maybe all three; that’d be disgusting.”

“Indeed,” Roy says. “Now go to sleep.”

Ed opens his mouth and inhales deeply to protest, and then Roy’s hand darts up, and he applies his fingernails to the spot at the back of Ed’s skull that makes even his automail toes curl.

“Cheater,” Ed manages when the first few frissons of beauteous marvelous joy have rippled out.

“I’ve been playing dirty since we met,” Roy says. “That’s probably your favorite thing about me.”

“Nah,” Ed says, writhing as Roy’s fingertips ghost over the nape of his neck. “My favorite thing about you is that even Drachma doesn’t suck as much when I’m with you.”

Roy’s hand stills, and he stares.

Ed’s face starts to go hot. “What?”

“Nothing,” Roy says, but Ed can see the edge of that dumb _This Went Exactly According to the Secret Plan_ smile around the pillow. “I didn’t realize you thought so highly of me.”

Is that a trick question? Well—trick question-as-a-statement-because-Roy’s-stupid-like-that? “Why wouldn’t I? You’ve got a really good heart, underneath all of the bastardly exterior stuff that I think is half-fake anyway; and you talk big, but you deliver. And you’re pretty funny when you don’t have to act all proper in front of people.”

Roy’s just smiling at him—sort of goo-ily now.

“ _What_?” Ed tries again.

“Nothing,” Roy says, brushing Ed’s hair back. He never means it when he says ‘Nothing’. Winry almost busted a rib laughing the one time Ed ranted to her about that. “I love your priorities.”

There’s something sort of premonitory tickling at the back of Ed’s skull, and it isn’t Roy’s fingers for once.

“Awesome,” he says. “I think they’re pretty kickass, myself.”

Roy is still smiling.

Ed scowls back and tucks up under Roy’s arm a bit more. “Go to sleep,” he says.

“Yes, Edward,” Roy says, and pulls him a little closer still.


End file.
